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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22677064">Tentative</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/pettiot/pseuds/pettiot'>pettiot</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Dragon Age II Kinkmeme [6]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Dragon Age II</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, Knotting, Xeno, genetic mating imperative, going into heat, mutually betrayed by their bodies</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2012-08-12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2012-08-12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 18:35:02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,522</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22677064</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/pettiot/pseuds/pettiot</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Merrill's choice of a childfree life falls foul of an outmoded biological imperative towards maintaining Elvhen genetic lines.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Fenris/Isabela, Fenris/Merrill</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Dragon Age II Kinkmeme [6]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1619464</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Tentative</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <br/>
</p><p>Fenris knew he had found perfection.</p>
<p>It happened over the last few kilometers, the realisation of the opposite of perfection, his lack. But he only knew there could be more when Merrill cried out as if startled or pinched and spun to face him, wide eyes holding his, full of brightness. Momentary bliss. He wanted something, closeness, he reached out a hand.</p>
<p>Merrill fled without a word. They gave chase down the last flight of stairs into the alienage. Fenris outdistanced Hawke and Anders, shouldering through his baldric, the sword's weight left behind.</p>
<p>His palm slammed against the door.</p>
<p>A grating sound as the heavy bar inside was levered into place.</p>
<p>The need came glugging up in him from somewhere deeper down. No bliss now, only the need for it. Fenris ripped at his belt, his armour. He watered Merrill’s threshold liberally.</p>
<p>It was early, almost before morning, and they had not slept or paused in their march through the night. Behind him the footsteps caught, slowed. Hawke’s bemusement, the mage’s baffled laugh.</p>
<p>‘Uh, Fenris. Not the privy—’</p>
<p>Fenris heard Merrill cursing the trickster wolf. She threw or dropped something which shattered.</p>
<p>The alienage elves were setting up market. In the periphery, a few younger males approached, loosening limbs as if for the fight. Fenris curled his lip, poured himself out. Instinct, old stories, the thread of a memory he had thought long gone. He stood back to make sure his arc splashed high, on both sides of the frame, the bleached wood turning gilt when wet. He tried, but the lintel was beyond him.</p>
<p>He ebbed, thin and watery drops, heavy with the scent of his excitement.</p>
<p>‘You could at least tuck it away.’</p>
<p>A hand on his shoulder. Friend, not competitor. ‘Fenris. Joke’s over.’</p>
<p>Fingers moving without thought, wet prick nudged behind fabric. He was half hard, and the fabric irritated.</p>
<p>He rubbed. It became a caress.</p>
<p>Hawke was snorting helplessly.</p>
<p>Why was this barrier here, when it was marked as his own? He should be on the other side. Where she waited—</p>
<p>‘Off you go,’ an elder’s voice. ‘Come on, stop gawking. You’ve all seen this before, if never declared with quite so much flair. You too, shems. There’s no place for humans here.’</p>
<p>‘But our friends—’</p>
<p>Fenris rattled the latch with his free hand.</p>
<p>‘It will be over in a week,’ the harhen said.</p>
<p>Fenris shouted, ‘Merrill!’</p>
<p>‘I’m not ready!’</p>
<p>‘Merrill!’</p>
<p>‘Please, Fenris! I’m so sorry, I never meant to— I need time!’</p>
<p>His cock felt as big as his arm. A fold of fabric could only hold so much. Fenris' palm slipped and skidded to uncover the curve, not enough. He groaned helplessly.</p>
<p>‘Merrill—’</p>
<p>‘Lass,’ the harhen said, ‘you’ll hurt more if you don’t let him in. What’s the problem? The other males will abide, I promise, we keep to civility here when a claim’s been made. But you need to let your young man in.’</p>
<p>A roar hardly recognisable as Merrill, ‘Don’t tell me what I need!’</p>
<p>The mage. ‘Now, listen. No one’s...doing...things to Merrill, when she literally barred her door—’</p>
<p>Male. Human; the genetic threat. This particular scent infertile, wrong, tainted. Hand to the taller man’s throat, teeth bared in a grimace almost as satisfying as the violence pooling liquid in his groin. Fenris’ vision flared blue and white—</p>
<p>Hawke and Anders. Fenris stared at the lyrium burning through the back of his gauntlet. The mage lay under him, five bruised stripes bleeding in part across his cheek, more mortified than afraid. His warm body, the heaving ribcage spreading Fenris’ thighs, making his cock throb.</p>
<p>Not right. Wrong body. But it was still beneath him.</p>
<p>‘Don’t you dare,’ Anders cried. Each attempt to roll Fenris off was exactly the motion to bring him closer. Fenris caught and turned the first punch to his face, the knuckles of the second skinning his cheek. He did not feel it.</p>
<p>The latch scraped open, uneven door stuttering against dirt.</p>
<p>‘Now,’ Merrill said unsteadily, ‘Fenris, I need you now—’ </p>
<p>***</p>
<p>On all fours. The compact weight of him was stark, armour biting. Fenris ripped her tunic to reach around and palm her breast. She did not wear smallclothes. He did not try to touch her otherwise with his hands, gauntlet grinding into the floor.</p>
<p>Merrill felt grit under her palms and knees, and the first shocking penetration. Her own brief mewling, Fenris’ gasping collapse almost immediately, heat shooting and swelling inside her.</p>
<p>He softened and slipped away.</p>
<p>‘No,’ soundless, her lips dry. She tried to move her hips to hold him. She clenched on nothing, wet flooding out.</p>
<p>Fenris staggered past the vial she had dropped, into her bathroom. She heard him coughing into the trench wretchedly, as if trying to make himself vomit.</p>
<p>Merrill waited, curled on her side, wondering if she should be afraid of him.</p>
<p>His come leaked, copious and already clammy. She wanted to wipe, but her clitoris was throbbing, the whole area swollen and aching.</p>
<p>Fenris lurched into her bedroom. He pulled a sheet off the bed and wiped his mouth, then threw the sheet over her mirror and turned it to face the wall.</p>
<p>‘Give me your hands.’</p>
<p>‘Why—’</p>
<p>Fenris growled and grabbed her wrists, pulled her to her feet. He ran the tips of his gauntlets over her palms, not quite scratching the way to her elbows. Handling her like a child, he pulled off the rest of her clothes.</p>
<p>She would not cover herself. There was no shame, except what he tried to induce.</p>
<p>Fenris continued his examination. Every skating metal touch made her want to moan. Then he licked a thumb and scrubbed at the rawness on her elbows, looked at the blood on her knees, and his brow furrowed, almost ashamed when he let her go. His tongue flicked to the corner of his mouth.</p>
<p>‘It wasn’t blood magic, Fenris! I would never, not to another living being—’</p>
<p>‘How am I to know?’</p>
<p>‘You must have seen this before.’ She did not know the word in common. ‘Shem'nan sa'lath.’</p>
<p>His neck bent, hair veiling his eyes. ‘I know it.’</p>
<p>The tickling at her calves was too much. Merrill scrubbed the tendrils of his come with one foot, unbalanced herself, and grabbed at Fenris.</p>
<p>He bore her hand. His eyes went to her breasts.</p>
<p>‘In Tevinter—’ The pupils swallowed the green. ‘There is no dignity in this.’</p>
<p>‘No dignity? Do you think I wanted this? All my life I spent being so careful. This would never have happened if you hadn’t responded like a — child fresh into his fullness!’</p>
<p>‘How was I to resist, witch? This madness of mine you cannot know.’</p>
<p>‘Can’t I? I let you in here, and you scorn me for it. I did it because otherwise you would have been howling on my doorstep for a week. Maybe you think that’s more dignified. If you prefer that, you know where the door is.’</p>
<p>‘You mock me. Stop mocking me.’</p>
<p>‘Well, you stop looking at my breasts.’ Merrill folded her arms, turned away. She had never been so helpless in her life.</p>
<p>A brush of fabric. Fenris draped her ripped tunic over her shoulders, and patted her awkwardly. She heard him shifting his feet.</p>
<p>He did not go.</p>
<p>‘I am sorry, Fenris, but you know it’s not entirely my fault.’</p>
<p>A hissing breath. ‘I know. It had been a long time since I'd seen-- I forgot the signs. Even so long as three days ago, I should have left Hawke’s camp. Not even a contradictory male scent to break the bond. We could have found the Dalish for you—’</p>
<p>‘No. Never.’</p>
<p>He was uncertain. ‘So you are not so smug as to refuse a man not of your people.’</p>
<p>‘Please don’t take this the wrong way. If there can even be a right way. I don’t want to bear a child right now. I have no clan to raise a child with, and this path of mine, if I went through this with them, it would just be another rein the Keeper could use, and no child should face that. Even you are better than—’</p>
<p>Fenris pulled off his gauntlets, and threw them to her table in a declaration of unhappiness. The breastplate next, his belts and pouches. He paced. Merrill clung to her tunic and wondered, abstract, if she had cleaned her change of clothes recently. She poked her books. Fenris checked the door, cursed to find it unlocked and set the bar across, while Merrill wondered who had closed it behind them.</p>
<p>‘Would you like some bread and cheese? It’s not much, but it’s fresh.’ </p>
<p>A snort, amused and irritated. Fenris would not dignify courtesy with an answer. He crouched by the broken flask, stirring the mess with a knobbly finger.</p>
<p>‘This is a contraceptive.’</p>
<p>‘I drank one lot already, but I dropped that one in the rush.’</p>
<p>‘We need to get a message to...Hawke? Isabela. For more. How long do these clear moments last?’</p>
<p>His breath came hard, hand hovering between his legs. Clenched his fist, mouth a thin line. But his tongue kept worrying at the corner, and asceticism fled into the parting curve.</p>
<p>Merrill tightened her thighs, which did the opposite of what she wanted it to do.</p>
<p>‘How I am supposed to know? As long as it takes for you to—’ She could not avert her eyes from his mouth.</p>
<p>‘You are, were virgin? At your age.’</p>
<p>A suspicious vibration in his voice.</p>
<p>‘I’ve had a few lovers. Only. Other things are more important than this. I’ve never been with another elf who—’</p>
<p>He uncoiled. The tattered tunic ghosted to the floor. Merrill did not resist. Fenris cupped her breasts as though he did not know what they were.</p>
<p>‘Can we please— the bed. Take off your leathers, I don’t want to bleed all over the buckles.’</p>
<p>Another disdainful snort. But it was acknowledgement.</p>
<p>After, he was angry, having overcome the fear. Angry but naked, pacing her bedroom, her house, penis flushed and half out of sheath. How did he walk like that? How could he? Marking her house. Back and forth with his wet prick, leaving her the obnoxious image of his nakedness in the context of her things.</p>
<p>Only a half blind human would have called Fenris pretty. Such rough, sunbattered skin, lank hair and fight-chipped teeth. He smelled like the Hanged Man, the smell all over her skin, leather and sweat and wine. Pockmarks across his shoulders from weathering some acid spell; so many battle scars, lumpy keloids darker than his skin. Under his ribs deep enough to rest her fist in, front and back, as if he had been impaled and left to heal imperfectly.</p>
<p>Not pretty. Certainly resilient.</p>
<p>Merrill thought the lyrium interesting, once. The possibility of learning new meanings, tracing references to new creators from the history lost to the Imperium. Now she saw the markings for how the mad Tevinter magister had meant them: mockery, pretty and meaningless, vallaslin where the pain honoured nothing, referenced nothing. </p>
<p>Small wonder Fenris stayed away from other elves, when the scrawling on his skin looked like a child’s illiterate meanderings. Poor imitations, ripe for mockery. A city elf's “Dalish” phase, commemorated in gibberish.</p>
<p>The thought of his humiliation, day after day, made her stomach hurt. Merrill did not know why.</p>
<p>‘You would think Tevinter has enough history of its own to corrupt.’</p>
<p>Fenris shuffled through expressions and settled on outrage.</p>
<p>‘If you mean my markings, witch—’</p>
<p>‘I have a name, Fenris. You’ll use it.’</p>
<p>Her special voice, for when she was to instruct and lead. No opportunity for compromise; reasoning and explanation was for later, after acceptance. This was the voice Merrill deplored and feared when the Keeper tried to use it on her.</p>
<p>For a moment it worked. Fenris’s eyes widened. His chin dropped, shoulders rolling into a subservient hunch.</p>
<p>Merrill was horrified.</p>
<p>‘It would be ridiculous otherwise, being lovers and not using names. Don’t you think?’</p>
<p>‘You don’t think,’ Fenris muttered. His posture did not straighten. But now he was fully hard, penis as proud as the rest of him wasn’t.</p>
<p>Merrill tried to look at his face instead. </p>
<p>‘But I do. A lot. Sometimes I think so much a whole day goes by before I notice, and I would be starving.’</p>
<p>‘Varric calls it brooding.’</p>
<p>‘When you do it, maybe.’</p>
<p>‘What does a wealthy merchant know of brooding? Brood if you want to, Merrill.’</p>
<p>‘I can do what I want without needing your permission, thank you. You don’t own brooding rights.’</p>
<p>Fenris looked up, eyes wild.</p>
<p>‘Are we having this conversation?’</p>
<p>‘I think so,’ Merrill said. ‘It's disconcerting.’</p>
<p>This time, she remembered Fenris’ knuckles grinding into her groin where he held back the knot. He could not get deep enough for her, physical longing driving her onto his fingers after he withdrew, but even he could not reach to scratch. </p>
<p>She came with the heel of his palm against her pubic bone, her own motion rocking herinto his hand. Clarity had come to him sooner this time, and she sought to avoid his eyes. Her womb was still cramping, ache momentarily a bliss for how infrequently she indulged herself. She did not need to see the way he would wipe his hand with deliberate disdain.</p>
<p>Merrill tucked to her side. Listed her discomforts as Fenris paced, wearing himself thin. The sensation at her groin suggested she was ready to burst into true pain. Wet and leaking, itching, thighs slipping and shining. Not a lack of lubrication, just too much friction and force. Fenris sweated as he paced, damp on his thighs and belly. The fingers shining. </p>
<p>The fingers, still shining with herself. The thin, flat thumb rubbing around and between.</p>
<p>Merrill wrenched her eyes away, to his face. His eyes were narrow, creased, profile angled away. He wet his lips.</p>
<p>‘Do you want to knot?’</p>
<p>He stopped. An inchoate sound.</p>
<p>‘We might as well get it over with,’ Merrill said, unsteadily. </p>
<p>Head shook firmly in negation, hair veiling his eyes.</p>
<p>‘You will, sooner or later. The contraceptive only works for a day, Isabela said. Maybe if we do it properly, stop fighting it, our bodies will let us finish this sooner. Or at least, give one of us long enough to get someone to run a message to the Hanged Man.’</p>
<p>‘No!’</p>
<p>The bastard shemlen elf would make her say it.</p>
<p>‘Fenris, I want. I want you to. So very much. You can, please, you know you can—’</p>
<p>Fenris widened his eyes at her. Retreated. In her other room, the table crashed to its side, chairs scattering. An impact against the wall. Merrill tucked her arms over her face, feeling the pain wrinkling her brow as Fenris threw the bar across the door, fist slamming into the hollow wood. He would run naked, would he? Let him.</p>
<p>Then the bar grated back into place, and Fenris stormed to the side of her bed, rigid with anger.</p>
<p>‘I said no, witch. I will not be bound to you.’ </p>
<p>‘Don’t talk to me with such revulsion.’</p>
<p>‘What will you do, silence me with your spells unless I speak the affirmation you wish to hear? Yes, mistress, I will fuck you how you wish it. I will give you everything of me. I will expose myself as you wish it, humiliate myself for your whim—’</p>
<p>The mask of his fury was so thin, threaded with tears. Merrill wondered if anyone else heard him the way she did, how readily he longed to break. Difficult to restrain her own emotion, simmering as closely as the desire.</p>
<p>‘It’s no humiliation, I want it as much as you do. Or, well, better to say our bodies want it. If you’re hungry, would you starve yourself?’</p>
<p>‘If all there is to eat comes from a rotting pile of rubbish, then yes.’</p>
<p>The shock stunned her into silence. Hurt flung her against the wall, biting at her eyes. He had not even sounded angry, merely resigned, as if stating a boring fact.</p>
<p>‘I didn’t mean—’ His words grabbing at the air and slid. Fenris sank to the bed at her side, hand hesitating over her shoulder, a tangible warmth. ‘I am sorry. That came out all wrong. You are many things I fear, but you are not rubbish. I mean only— This is not what we wanted, whatever the body dictates. I will fight it as best I can.’</p>
<p>The implication being that she was weak, if she did not.</p>
<p>If you don’t want to, then we won’t. That was what she should have said. </p>
<p>Desire cramped tight in her belly again, a desperate longing rushing outwards, wetness spreading from her legs. He couldn’t see it happening, at least. What he wanted. Merrill wanted to hit walls too, and kick chairs in a tantrum. What about what she wanted? Her younger days, when she had time for sex, she learned her orgasms were never more than perfunctory without the fullness.</p>
<p>Fenris curled behind her, hard between her buttocks. Merrill pushed against him until he slid inside her. A hand lifting her leg, the strength in which she could trust her full weight. Fenris held her painfully wide and open, and in this position never thrust deep enough to risk tying with her. </p>
<p>Merrill listened to her own pleas from a distance, felt her hips burning against the linen sheet as she tried to break his rhythm or control, whichever would win what she wanted. Fenris growled, nose pressed to her nape. </p>
<p>‘Mewling. Mage,’ Fenris groaned, as if each word cost him, ‘Merrill. Why do you beg me, of all people—' A half-hearted sob. 'Do you hate yourself?’</p>
<p>A wave of sensation, burning through her, lifting her away. Merrill always fought, her path, her demon, her people. She should have fought him. For once, it was easier to surrender, throat opening to release something scarcely mortal but wholly wanting. Fenris held her securely.</p>
<p>When Merrill returned to clarity again, she was not in her bed. A blanket spread on the floor of her anteroom, body hurting. Fenris had righted the table. He stood hunched over the edge, hands flat on the surface, as if in pain.</p>
<p>Merrill went to stand, and rawness asserted cruel rhythm between her thighs. She looked down, expecting to see blood, finding only come and myriad bruises, redness on her vulva, the prints on her hips.</p>
<p>‘That cheese you mentioned,’ Fenris said, groggily.</p>
<p>Hunger. Yes. Stomach rumbling deep enough to match his voice. Merrill stumbled to the larder and fetched the necessary. Fenris fingered the bread she broke apart for him, for want of the control to wield a knife to slice. Parched without realising, Merrill cupped her hands and drank directly from her water barrel before scooping two proper cups.</p>
<p>‘You said this was fresh.’ Fenris pushed over the bread.</p>
<p>‘It is—’ Crumbling at her fingers, dry and sharp. Fenris sniffed, fastidious, at the green touching the corners of the cheese. ‘It was.’</p>
<p>Fenris looked briefly panicked, pupils dilating. Then he shoved the cheese in his mouth, even as he tried to speak. ‘How many days do you think—’</p>
<p>Comparing notes, he remembered more sex than she did, likely from his effort to keep that last control he could. The thought sparked an unnecessary bitterness in Merrill. How many pleas and demands had he wrung out of her, thrilling to hear it. The blood mage who could not even control herself in bed, begging for him. Of all people.</p>
<p>Merrill ate because she needed to, hardly aware when she slumped out of the chair. More comfortable squatting on the blanket, soiled as it was, wet pattering out of her like she could not control her bowels. </p>
<p>She felt her face crumple, water salting and softening the bread on its way to her mouth.</p>
<p>‘Merrill.’</p>
<p>Fenris sounded so tired.</p>
<p>‘Oh, shut up. It’s my house, I’m allowed to cry. I feel like I’ve been—’</p>
<p>Whether he had thought to offer comfort or something else, the shadow recoiled from her periphery with a wounded sound. ‘I am no rapist. Please, I am not!’</p>
<p>Something almost panicky there again. His mask thinner than before. Merrill stopped crying in her astonishment. Fenris curled against the wall opposite, his arms wrapped around his belly as if punched. He looked at the floor, wearing the same shamed shoulders, as if she had startled submission from him again.</p>
<p>‘I didn’t mean you, I just. It hurts, Fenris. As if my body is punishing me because I chose not to...not to breed, chose another path. It’s not right,’ the tears starting again, ‘it’s not right, as if my own body is raping me. I don’t like this, I don’t like what it makes me do. This feels like a dream that I think will turn into a nightmare.’</p>
<p>Fenris nodded silently, still looking at the floor. ‘I estimate you— we only lost a day. It was morning when this started, and morning again outside. And I was thirsty, but not—’</p>
<p>Someone knocked on the door, the latch jiggling with no concern for privacy. ‘Kitten?’</p>
<p>Joy surged through Merrill, as uncontrollable as the other. ‘Isabela. Oh, Isabela!’ She went to the latch, the small of her back protesting her speed.</p>
<p>‘Don’t!’ Fenris again. As if she could forget him. Hands over his crotch with a sudden, ridiculous modesty which drew more attention than his nudity. ‘I do not want her to see me like this. Not Isabela.’</p>
<p>‘Like what?’</p>
<p>‘Kitten?’ The lock rasped, something lifting the bar and slipping. Trying again. ‘Do you need help?’</p>
<p>‘Helpless,’ Fenris said. </p>
<p>In the pause as Merrill stared at him, Fenris took a deep breath, stopped cupping his privates, and collected Merrill’s ripped tunic from the floor.</p>
<p>‘If you drape this backwards, it will cover you. The rip is only on one side.’</p>
<p>‘Fenris, is that you? How are you two doing? Anders was going on and on—’</p>
<p>Merrill let Fenris dress her with deft moves, mind trying to weave something from his words. To understand. Fenris sidestepped the opening swing of the door, the panel hiding him behind.</p>
<p>The relief on Isabela’s face, the tenderness. ‘My poor kitten, look at you. Are you all right? Is Fenris—’</p>
<p>‘I’m so glad to see you.’ Merrill felt awkward and pained when she put her palm out to stop Isabela’s ingress. ‘It’s not a good time to come in. I haven't cleaned for a long while.’</p>
<p>Isabela’s nose wrinkled. ‘I understand.’ Eyes flicking over the reversed tunic, the visible bruises and scrapes on Merrill’s legs and forearms. ‘Unlike those other two blind bloody idiots, laughing about Fen— Oh, never mind, I brought you some supplies.’ Isabela indicated the overflowing basket placed on the porch. ‘Potions, food. Some sleeping drought. More of the lady pirate’s essential prophylactic.</p>
<p>‘Isabela, you—’ An embrace came Merrill could not help or avoid, noisome as it must have been for her friend. Merrill felt the tears threatening again. ‘Thank you.’</p>
<p>‘Thank you,’ Fenris said from behind the door, stiff as the wood. 'Isabela.'</p>
<p>Isabela’s expression changed again, hurt. Sympathy. Her knuckles brushed the door gently. If the embrace had been an attempt to come inside, she made no attempt now. ‘And how are you?’</p>
<p>‘I’ve...’ Merrill saw Fenris closing his eyes, tight. Wetness beaded along the lashes, spiking them, so briefly. Then he looked at nothing. ‘Been better.’</p>
<p>Isabela stroked the door again. ‘I should hope you’ll be nothing but your best, Fenris. You would never forgive yourself otherwise.' Isabela's eyes found Merrill's, the smile broad and wholesome. 'Kitten will be fine, of course. You always give everything your best. You never think you'll lose, you can't afford it.’</p>
<p>Fenris placed his palm against his side of the door. The lyrium sense thickened, as if he would phase through, touch Isabela's hand. </p>
<p>He let his palm fall.</p>
<p>Isabela let her own hand fall and shook herself, brisk, smile full of hurt again. </p>
<p>'I'll be back tomorrow, kitten, with more of that tea you like already brewed, clean linen and clothes.' Another embrace, where Merrill could not help but cling as if Isabela's clean salt smell, the fresh sweat and solid body could stop the desire already rising. Flames, cradled between her hips.</p>
<p>Merrill dragged the basket inside. Fenris saw to the door's security. They fell to the contents wilfully. Merrill came up clutching a potion and an apple, and found Fenris holding the same.</p>
<p>They devoured at the same pace. Merrill crouched in brief pleasure, heels crossed loosely to ease the ache, sucking at the apple's core. She fondled a potion flask in happy anticipation of relief. Fenris was trying to cup sufficient liquid in one palm to slick his stiffening cock.</p>
<p>'That looks raw.'</p>
<p>Fenris gave her a withering look. 'I wonder why.'</p>
<p>Before she could think twice, Merrill swigged from the potion and leaned forward, reaching for his erection.</p>
<p>Fenris startled, potion dripping from his fingers. The liquid curled slight numbness around her tongue and lips. Merrill parted her lips and tried to speak with her eyes.</p>
<p>Almost a whisper, deep and low. 'Go on.'</p>
<p>The taste was mostly potion, her mouthful of liquid abundent. Fenris was so long, hard in a way that Merrill could not feel during penetration. His hands wavered, but he did not try to touch her hair.</p>
<p>'That feels...very good.'</p>
<p>Merrill almost laughed, potion spilling forward with her tongue. Slick and smooth. Now the taste was more of him, and a little of her. She could feel the knot nearer his body, sheathed and fledgling, soft skin sliding as she tried to go deeper, to get her lips around it. Startled herself by coughing, potion wasted on her breasts and his legs. </p>
<p>'I'm sorry! That was almost—' </p>
<p>Inexorable, Fenris went to his knees and pushed her flat. The position startled pain from more bruises, and Fenris shouldered her legs apart roughly, seating himself between so she could not reflexively close.</p>
<p>Merrill resigned herself. </p>
<p>Then he twisted neatly, reached for another flask.</p>
<p>He anointed her. Examining her intimately with the focus of a craftsman, with thorough fingers. Slick and sliding, pushing potion deep and cool. A brief burst of pain at the penetration, soon followed by cool bliss. He traced the shape of her lips, her clitoris, potion everywhere, puddling. His fingers were long but blunt, narrow halfmoon nails with no rough edges.</p>
<p>'Fenris—'</p>
<p>Moaning and needy. Merrill remembered with more anger than shame, him telling her what she was. Mewling mage. Beg me again.</p>
<p>When he looked up, she could see what his control was costing. 'Your bruises. Drink a potion, at least—'</p>
<p>'After. I'll only get more.'</p>
<p>His free hand was on her breasts, his rhythm as brutal as before. It did not matter. As if she had been remade. Fenris came in a few strokes regardless, crumpling.</p>
<p>'Stay in me.' He touched different places inside her as he softened, thinner but just as long, her body clenching around him. Not so raw. Merrill could not stop moving her hips, small circles, heels behind his knees and pulling him close.</p>
<p>Fenris took his weight on his forearms, the biceps firm by her shoulders. He pressed a blind kiss to her jaw. </p>
<p>'You were not a virgin,' Fenris said.</p>
<p>'Well, I was once. Fifteen years ago. Or is it twenty now? I was always very desperate to get things done very quickly.'</p>
<p>'I have not had nearly as long. To get used to—'</p>
<p>'Fenris. Oh. No, no. Don't tell me this!'</p>
<p>'Maybe two days. I can't quite remember, foggy—'</p>
<p>He was almost smiling, his voice pained.</p>
<p>'I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry. Is that the wrong thing to say? I don't know. Are you...are you alright?'</p>
<p>Isabela's words, her strange hurt, seemed now to make sense. Merrill wanted to rub her eyes, but could not take her hands from Fenris.</p>
<p>'I expect I will recover. As will you. You seem durable.'</p>
<p>'Thank you. I think.'</p>
<p>'I like,' Breath gusting against her ear. Wavering. 'I like your stomach?'</p>
<p>'My stomach?'</p>
<p>'This part, it is very sleek, toned. Admirable,' a finger touched her navel, then the pinch of her waist, firm enough to test the resilience of her muscle. </p>
<p>'Um. Please don't...try to...whatever you're doing. Oh, creators spare me seduction. You are fine, Fenris. You are fine silent, or talking, or whatever you want to, but you don't have to—'</p>
<p>'I like your breasts.' This time it was a growl. Pushing up her right one hard enough it hurt, testing her, again. The solidity, or the softness. Merrill liked breasts too. His were far too flat. Fenris rolled his palm across the nipple.</p>
<p>'That one I noticed.'</p>
<p>'I like them a lot. The way they rest when you are on your back.'</p>
<p>'Yes...'</p>
<p>'When you are on your knees, especially, and they hang heavy.' Fenris thickened inside her, a hard pulse. </p>
<p>'You probably shouldn't try to itemise a person, Fenris. If you only like my breasts, you might make me selfconscious about, oh, I don't know. My feet.'</p>
<p>He shifted position, sinking deeper, groaning. He caught and kissed her ankle.</p>
<p>'Or, say, the back of my knee—'</p>
<p>Fenris pushed her knees to her ears, bent and licked. His eyes were dark, unfocused.</p>
<p>'Call for me,' Fenris said.</p>
<p>'No. Your turn. Moan for me.'</p>
<p>'Merrill.'</p>
<p>His buttocks were chill with sweat. Merrill dug in her fingers, pulling him close, grinding against him. 'Push. Stop pulling out. Stay in, deep. Let me move.'</p>
<p>'Merrill. Ah, Merrill—'</p>
<p>The lassitude this time was nearly complete enough to send her to sleep.  Merrill rose from the mist only for the pain of her hipbones protesting the floor. </p>
<p>Fenris sat next to her this time, pensive. His knuckles rested against hers. Power like a golden buzz.</p>
<p>'It's night.'</p>
<p>'Really. Really, I—'</p>
<p>She needed to go to the bathroom. Merrill used Fenris' shoulder to stand, then his head, staggering hastily to the nook. </p>
<p>'I stripped the sheets,' Fenris called from the bedroom. 'And. Uh. Flipped the mattress. It was necessary. We might be tired enough to sleep this time.'</p>
<p>'That would be. Very good.' </p>
<p>Merrill remembered the words in his own mouth. Very good. The feel of his cock in her mouth. Her cheeks and ears burned. She had made demands of him this time, hollow, desperate moans pouring from his mouth like a flood, shaping her name.</p>
<p>When she emerged into the bedroom, Fenris hunched by the hearth and a steaming tub of water.</p>
<p>'Oh, I could have heated that—'</p>
<p>'It was only time and fuel,' Fenris said roughly, then tried to soften. 'No need or cost significant enough to warrant need for magic.'</p>
<p>'You should bathe first. You heated it the way you liked it. I can heat it again after.'</p>
<p>'I thought we could. Never mind.'</p>
<p>Again that dejected slump to his shoulders, as if she had punished him with assumptions.</p>
<p>'You— ah. Together. I wasn't thinking, certainly we can—'</p>
<p>They must both be a little mad by now. But Merrill thought maybe she could even love him a little because of it, allowing this bubble of disbelief. He roughed a wet cloth with lather and washed her, with a sensual attention to detail which saw him even wiping the soles of her feet, her buttocks, and gently under her arms. The potion he had added to the water numbed the worst of aches, and sleeked her skin elsewhere.</p>
<p>And then Merrill did the same for him, wondering if it alarmed and frightened him as much as it did her, to let him behind her back in such a strange state, a strange need. Such broad, pockmarked shoulders, the lovely compactness of his waist, those thighs. The small of his back rippled with tiny muscles, and he groaned when she scrubbed at the crossed lyrium lines topping his buttocks. </p>
<p>In bed, which smelled only slightly of sex, Merrill asked him, 'Are you in love with Isabela?'</p>
<p>'No.' The tone said something else. 'She is my best friend.'</p>
<p>'I'm glad. That you have someone who understands.'</p>
<p>'Isabela does not understand. But she tries, and knows when not to try. More than I expected.'</p>
<p>'Isabela is my best friend, too. She's a good person.'</p>
<p>'Very good,' Fenris said.</p>
<p>After a moment, Merrill realised the shudders were Fenris trying to stifle his laugh. She almost joined him, but Fenris stilled as abruptly, his eyes fierce. Then Merrill realised the fierceness was not for her.</p>
<p>'I am always afraid I will be cornered and caught. I ran for four years. If I ignore what I have seen in Tevinter. If I forget the humiliation imparted on elves there, as slaves, even to function and anatomy.' Fenris looked along his body, a modest cringe for his flaccid state, eyes lingering along her breasts on the return upwards. 'If I pretend I have not witnessed, I am still afraid to tie because I will not be able to run. For however long I am vulnerable and caught. I cannot fight if we are. Stuck.'</p>
<p>'But I would defend you.'</p>
<p>A wildness behind his fervour. 'What?'</p>
<p>'I would defend you. If someone came bursting through the door you've been so careful to bar. I don't need to move or swing a great sword.'</p>
<p>'You would defend me.'</p>
<p>'Is that so unbelievable? You've seen me fight.'</p>
<p>'I have,' Fenris said uncertainly, then firmer, 'I have.'</p>
<p>'If you considered your freedom need or cost significant enough, of course.'</p>
<p>His lips pressed against her shoulder, hesitant.</p>
<p>In the morning, Fenris moved atop her before she woke, slick with potion as he fingered her awake, penis hard as the bone of her hip under skin. </p>
<p>His desperation was expected after so long without release; shem'nan sa'lath was not kind to needs like sleep. Merrill spread her legs, wanting to moan.</p>
<p>Desperation did not explain his mouth, dry and clumsy on hers. </p>
<p>The hand which caressed her breast, gentle. This finger from nipple to lips soft as kisses, or the dark longing in his eyes when she took her finger into her mouth.</p>
<p>He coaxed her to her belly, then her knees, awkward nudges and pleading eyes, as if words were beyond this battered child.</p>
<p>It was utterly frightening, the hardness of his length and the change in his manner. The press of his knot, too dry after their bath last night, when he should have thrust thick into the spill of earlier, hasty sex. Merrill clenched her jaw, because it stung and was large and he kept slipping half in and out, as if he was afraid to thrust with force used so willingly the days before. </p>
<p>Desire warmed and slicked her with each failed attempt, body waking to match the need in her mind. Her hips moved against him, cheeks and ears flushed. She pushed herself up to her palms, curving the small of her back. His hand stuttered along her spine, cupped her shoulder. His grip tightened.</p>
<p>'Now, now, creators now, Fen—'</p>
<p>Force threw her to her face. Merrill reached back, held her cheeks open for him, hands around her thighs. Pulling and parting. A second thrust, quick enough the sensation exploded too late, when she screamed and could not even flinch away.</p>
<p>Moaning, both of them, until the pain faded.</p>
<p>'You were right,' Fenris curled over her, head resting between her shoulders. 'I want to, very much.'</p>
<p>'And it's still all right,' Merrill quavered. 'Just startled.'</p>
<p>Sluggishly, 'You did not drink the contraceptive.'</p>
<p>Cold coiled through her belly, chased by his heat, thick and wet, so full. He touched different parts of her like this, hurting and uncomfortable. And perfect. She would never feel hunger again. She touched her belly, feeling him. Filling her. </p>
<p>'Yes I did.'</p>
<p>He was shaking, soft whimpers. </p>
<p>Hard to move with him buried deep, and no give, none at all. Each shift of hips or thigh against thigh touched more inside, until they settled into a tangle on their sides. </p>
<p>'This is,' his voice still thick and distant. 'A most solemn of feelings.'</p>
<p>Merrill wanted to grind against him and come screaming an obscenity. She slid his hand between her legs. 'Make me orgasm.'</p>
<p>Which came implacable and almost instantly, when Fenris started, as if only that one touch had been necessary atop the intense stretch, the last drop before overflowing. Merrill moaned higher and higher, thighs quivering. Flushing and panting afterwards. His presence inside her took away the ridiculousness of these bodies. His thrusts kept on, shallow and surreal, his own pleasure peaking and falling with his breath. Hurt and strain. She could probably come again.</p>
<p>'Solemn,' Merrill rasped, 'or something like it.'</p>
<p>'You would be a mother now, if you had not drunk.'</p>
<p>'I might have borne a child. I don't know about the mothering.'</p>
<p>'Ah.'</p>
<p>'You sound sad.'</p>
<p>'I don't know. An odd thing, this.'</p>
<p>'That is an understatement. Varric will have your hide.'</p>
<p>Merrill heard laughter in the smile he pressed against her nape.</p>
<p>'Not for understatement,' Fenris said. 'You have many friends, blood mage.'</p>
<p>'They're your friends too.'</p>
<p>'Hm.'</p>
<p>Maybe they weren't, not in the way Fenris called Isabela a friend. Hawke and Anders pushed. Sometimes Varric watched as if they were his entertainment. And she...ignored Fenris, she realised. Because she expected him to adapt to her, as she did of Kirkwall itself, this bewildering place that unexpectedly did not provide any easy translation for her convenience.</p>
<p>She was arrogant, the Keeper had never quite said. Lucky that she and Fenris had found a way through this tangle without killing each other. </p>
<p>'Whatever you call them. They would defend you, too, just as I would, even against every magister in Tevinter.'</p>
<p>'I shall not be deceived by your sweet talk, witch. You simply want me for my body.'</p>
<p>A startled moment, then Merrill laughed. Fenris breathed into her hair and held her hand.</p>
<p>'I could try to avoid using blood magic around you. I shouldn't flaunt it, and have no need to risk it unless the need is pressing—'</p>
<p>'No need is pressing enough.' Sleepily.</p>
<p>'But what if—' A warning grumble from behind. 'What if I could have stopped this whole affair with three drops of my own blood.'</p>
<p>No hesitation. 'No need is pressing enough. Stop provoking me. I will not engage in debate.'</p>
<p>'I'm not sorry I am who I am, Fenris. We can never really share more than this. Well, except our best friend.'</p>
<p>This time he hesitated. 'I have no problem with that.'</p>
<p>Another three days, interspersed with Isabela's emergency visits, the sanity she carried with her like a bubble of fresh rain, and clean sheets. The last day they slept and had sex once in the late afternoon. Then they ate, bathed, and made love again in the evening, because Fenris had picked up his trousers and looked at them as if he had never seen them before, and Merrill reached out and stroked his arm, and he turned to her without need.</p>
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